The Class of 2026 will be inducted into the Georgia Golf Hall of Fame on Saturday, March 14, 2026, at Atlanta Athletic Club in Johns Creek.
Meet the Class of 2026:
Louis Brown
Frank Culpepper
Hugh Royer, III
Dan Van Horn
Biographical information on the four inductees:
Louis Brown
Born in Newnan, Ga., in 1963, Louis Brown attended Newnan High School while playing competitive junior golf. He found success early with a win at the 1980 Atlanta Junior Golf Association Grand Championship and tied for runner-up at the 1981 Georgia Junior Championship. Later in the summer of 1981 Brown qualified for his first USGA national championship (the U.S. Junior Amateur), where he advanced to the quarterfinals. In 1982, he won the Rolex Tournament of Champions on the American Junior Golf Association circuit and was ranked sixth in Golf Digest’s list of America’s top junior golfers.
After high school Brown moved to Athens in 1982 to play golf at the University of Georgia. He was a four-year letterman (1982-85), earned All-SEC Second Team honors (1983, 1985), was NCAA All-America Honorable Mention (1984), and team captain (1985). Brown won an individual title at the 1984 MSU Invitational and led his team to victory at the 1982 and 1983 SEC Championships. He graduated with a degree in Business Administration in 1985.
Once his college days concluded in Athens, Brown claimed the biggest win of his young amateur career to that point at the 1985 Georgia Amateur Championship. He broke through for his first state amateur title at Pinetree Country Club in Kennesaw after finishing in the runner-up spot in 1982 and 1984. He added a win at the 1985 Dixie Amateur and prior to that had two second-place showings at the 1983 Southeastern Amateur and the 1984 Northeast Amateur.
Brown turned professional in the late 1980s and competed on several tours around the world, including the Australian PGA Tour where he won the Nedlands Masters in 1989 and was named rookie of the year. Brown’s second victory as a professional happened in 1990 at the Fort McMurray Open on the Canadian PGA Tour, where he also finished fourth on that circuit’s Order of Merit. His best finish in nine PGA TOUR events came at the Buick Southern Open in 1991 where he tied for 16th. While teaching at Legacy Golf Links in Smyrna, Brown won the 1997 Georgia Open and the 1998 Atlanta Open.
After almost 20 years as a professional golfer, Brown regained his amateur status and began a career in wealth management. He would still compete sparingly in GSGA events – he partnered with Mark Strickland in 2008 to win the Georgia Four-Ball Championship. As a senior golfer Brown seemed to elevate his game once again, winning the 2020 Georgia Senior Championship.
The highlight of Brown’s amateur golf career came in 2024 when he won the U.S. Senior Amateur Championship at
The Honors Course in Ooltewah, Tenn. – the third time qualifying for this event. He became the fifth Georgian to win the U.S. Senior Amateur, all in the last 25 years.
Most recently, the 62-year-old advanced to the round of 64 at the U.S. Mid-Amateur Championship this past summer at Troon Country Club in Scottsdale, Ariz.
Off the course Brown founded The Evergreen Society in 2010. This Atlanta-based group shares a passion for the game while supporting efforts to improve young people’s lives through exposure to golf. While not competing at a high level himself, Brown has devoted time to teaching the game to others through full swing and short game analysis, while also offering instruction with the First Tee of Metro Atlanta.
Frank Culpepper
Born in Valdosta, Ga., in 1934, Frank Culpepper attended Jordan Vocational High School in Columbus, Ga., before relocating back to his hometown at enroll at Valdosta State University. He was involved in athletics in his early years and primarily played baseball. In 1956 while working at a paper mill, an accident occurred which resulted in Culpepper losing the lower portion of his right arm. He was 22 years old.
In 1968, Culpepper and his family moved to New Zealand for a couple of years to complete missionary. It was in New Zealand where he was introduced to golf. As an amputee, he had to reinvent the traditional golf swing, so he developed his own prosthesis to attach a golf club to. He didn’t just take up the game to play casually; he became one of the most decorated adaptive golf players of his time.
His dominance spanned across the state, regional and national levels. Culpepper won the Georgia State Amputee Golf Tournament nine times (1975, 1976, 1984, 1996, 1998, 1999, 2005, 2007, 2008). He captured titles on the Southeastern Amputee Golf Association also nine times (1973, 1980, 1985, 1989, 1990, 1991, 1996, 1997, 2006). On the National Amputee Golf Association circuit, Culpepper won a total of 13 times combined in the Championship Division and the One-Arm Division.
Thirty-eight years after his accident at the age of 60, Culpepper qualified for the U.S. Senior Amateur Championship at The Champions Golf Club in Nicholasville, Kentucky.
Culpepper designed his own attachments to help him swing a golf club that would fit on his prosthetic. Once he became experienced in this craft, he would produce and provide these attachments to other amputees to aid in their golf game. Over time, prosthetic manufacturers began to incorporate elements of his design into their own products.
In 2010 the ‘Frank Culpepper Award’ was created by the annual Georgia State Amputee Golf Tournament, given to an individual who has contributed significantly to adaptive golf.
Culpepper passed away in 2023.
Hugh Royer, III
Born in Columbus, Ga., in 1964, Hugh Royer, III was introduced to golf from day one by his father, Hugh Royer, Jr., who was the head golf professional at Callaway Gardens. As a junior, the younger Royer would travel with his father as he still played professionally.
Royer attended high school at the Brookstone School in Columbus before earning a scholarship to play golf at Mississippi State University. In his two years in Starkville, Miss., Royer earned seven top 10 finishes, including one tournament win, and led the team in stroke average both seasons. He then transferred back home to Columbus College (now Columbus State University), where he won three titles in 1985, including the NCAA Division II National Championship and was named NCAA Division II All-America.
In 1986, Royer won the Georgia Amateur Championship at Coosa Country Club in Rome as well as the Southeastern Amateur. In 1987, he underwent open-heart surgery, recovered, and went on to finish second at the Georgia Amateur Championship that same year and won both the Azalea Amateur Invitational and the Western Amateur. Royer and his father (who won the Georgia Amateur in 1958) are one of two father-son winners of the state championship (P. Dan Yates, Jr., and Danny Yates). Royer is one of four players to win both the Georgia Amateur Championship and the Western Amateur (Tommy Aaron, Billy Key, Charles Yates).
Royer turned professional in 1987 and would spend the next six years competing on the South African Tour, winning one time with several runner-up marks. He then spent time on the Nike Tour (now Korn Ferry Tour) winning four times (two in 1993; two in 1995) before earning his PGA TOUR card. He competed on tour from 1996 to 1998, where he finished in the top 10 four times.
After his professional playing days, Royer turned to teaching. He served as the director of instruction at the Columbus Golf Academy, a senior instructor at the International Junior Golf Academy in Hilton Head, and as the director of instruction at the Champions Golf Academy at Long Bay Club in Myrtle Beach.
Royer was inducted into the Columbus State University Athletic Hall of Fame in 2000. With this induction, the Royer’s will become the fourth father-son duo in the Georgia Golf Hall of Fame, joining Davis Love, Jr./Davis Love, III; George Sargent/Harold Sargent/Jack Sargent; and P. Dan Yates, Jr./Danny Yates.
Dan Van Horn
Born in Lewisburg, Tenn., in 1952, Dan Van Horn attended high school in Russellville, Ark., before enrolling at the University of Arkansas in Fayetteville. He earned a degree in mechanical engineering in 1975 and shortly thereafter moved to Maryland to start both a family and a business.
Years later in 1991, Van Horn sold his business and spent a year competing on mini tours. For a couple years after that he served at LINKS Ministry, a fellowship of Christian golfers with a mission to build, encourage and help pastors both nationally and internationally. In 1994, Van Horn moved his family back down south to Duluth, Ga., where they joined St. Ives Country Club.
In 1995, Van Horn coached his 8-year-old son’s youth baseball team. The lightweight, aluminum bats his team used caught his eye by the way they helped the kids swing faster. As a former golf professional with an engineering background, Van Horn thought about how that logic could be used with golf clubs. His son had a set of cut-down clubs, so he decided to remove 25% of the weight from the back of a shortened 5-wood club head. Van Horn noticed immediate improvement on his son’s swing. Something then clicked in his mind, and with the support of family and friends, he would form a company called U.S. Kids Golf in 1996.
The company began distributing its original clubs in 1997 – the Ultralight Kidsklubs in three sizes. Van Horn wanted to add golf competition to his company’s offering, so U.S. Kids Golf hosted its first World Championship at Jekyll Island Golf Resort in 2000. The inaugural event hosted over 200 players, and the next year saw over 500 participants.
Under Van Horn’s leadership, U.S. Kids Golf expanded its offerings to become a global leader in junior golf development. The U.S. Kids Golf Foundation was established in 2001 to support junior tournaments, player development and coach certification programs.
In 2014, the foundation introduced another initiative, the U.S. Kids Golf Coaches Institute. This program supports PGA and LPGA professionals as they seek to help young players fall in love with the game. Additionally, the institute annually honors the world’s best coaches through the ‘Top 50 Kids Coaches’ and the ‘Master Top 50 Kids Coaches’ awards.
Today, the U.S. Kids Golf Foundation hosts more than 1,500 tournaments every year. Additionally, over 1,600 players from over 50 countries compete in the U.S. Kids Golf World Championships held at Pinehurst Resort in North Carolina.
U.S. Kids Golf is the world’s leading provider of golf equipment and services for young golfers. The mission of U.S. Kids Golf is to help kids have fun learning the lifelong game of golf and to encourage family interaction that builds lasting memories.
U.S. Kids Golf was named a ‘Top 100 Business in Golf’ in 2018 by the National Golf Foundation. Van Horn was inducted into the Arkansas Golf Hall of Fame in 2017.
These four inductees will bring the total number of Georgia Golf Hall of Fame members to 143.
The Georgia Golf Hall of Fame is dedicated to the preservation of Georgia’s golf traditions, heritage, achievements, and excellence.
The Georgia Golf Hall of Fame was created by an act of the Georgia General Assembly in 1982. Headquartered in Augusta, the Georgia Golf Hall of Fame began inducting members in 1989 and held an induction ceremony in Augusta annually through 2009. During the 2010 legislative session, the Georgia Golf Hall of Fame Authority and Commission was abolished. The Georgia State Golf Association then entered into an agreement with the Georgia Department of Economic Development to manage the ongoing activities associated with the Georgia Golf Hall of Fame. The GSGA is authorized to host the annual induction ceremony and store and display Hall of Fame members’ memorabilia in the Georgia Golf Hall of Fame Room inside Murray Golf House at Bobby Jones Golf Course in Atlanta. The induction ceremony was revived in 2011 at the Atlanta Athletic Club in Johns Creek and is now held annually.
Click here for more information on the Georgia Golf Hall of Fame.
